AQUATIC CONSERVATION: MARINE AND FRESHWATER ECOSYSTEMS, VOL. 2, 209-210 (1992)

BOOK REVIEWS SEAWEED RESOURCES IN EUROPE: USES AND POTENTIAL, edited by Michael D. Guiry and Gerald Blunden. John Wiley & Sons Ltd., Chichester, 1991. xi+432pp. Price: f65.00. ISBN 0 471 92947 6.

It is unusual for a book on algal utilization to be written with a specifically European perspective but that is exactly what this book attempts. It arose from the group of scientists involved since 1985 with the European Community’s COST 48 Action Programme on Aquatic Primary Biomass (Marine Macroalgae). With one excep- tion all the authors are from a European country. The European approach is largely preserved although there are some areas of potential exploitation of seaweeds in Europe, such as cultivation, where it is necessary to review and learn from the much greater experience already gained in other continents.

The first chapter sets the botanical scene by providing a geographical and taxonomic guide to European sea- weeds of economic importance. The reference list for this short chapter provides an excellent summary of Euro- pean species check-lists and identification works which will be of use to many phycologists, both pure and applied. The remaining chapters fall into two groups dealing with the uses of seaweeds and the ways in which seaweed stocks can be obtained.

The chapters on the uses span a wide range of topics which include, animal and human nutrition, agriculture, cosmetics, bioconversion, waste water treatment, and polysaccharide applications. A lengthy chapter deals with the nutritional value of seaweeds to both man and animals including farmed marine organisms. An expansion of the nutritional use of seaweeds is advocated. After brief consideration of the use of whole weeds, such as maerl and Ascophyllum mulch, as soil binders and conditioners, the agricultural use concen- trates on the possible fertilizer role of plant products, such as hormones, in seaweed extracts. An unusual chapter is the review of seaweeds as cosmetics which to some extent involves the well-known phycocolloids whose uses appear throughout the book. The production processes and effectiveness of seaweed cosmetics are described and a potential for expansion of the industry is seen subject to problems in obtaining suitable quality algal stock. Much work has been done in the last decade on seaweed bioconversion and a useful review of this is given in one of the more lengthy chapters which considers techniques for composting, methanization, and fermen- tation to other products. In this chapter it is argued that there are many more uses to which seaweeds can be put and, that at present, we use very little of the available seaweed stock. Bioconversion is seen as an answer to the disposal of nuisance blooms of seaweed which have

1052-7613/92/020209-02$06.00 01992 by John Wiley & Sons, Ltd

recently been coming more to public attention. The suitability of seaweeds for waste-water treatment is considered in another chapter. While it is now feasible to remove nitrogenous nutrients using seaweeds the nitrogen:phosphorus ratio of some wastes may cause a problem. Three chapters are concerned with algal polysaccharides which have been the mainstay of the European seaweed industry. These cover polysaccharide uses in food and pharmaceuticals, comparison of sea- weed and microbial polysaccharides with suggestions about their possible future biotechnological modifica- tion, and the application of algal polysaccharides in immobilization media for cells and enzymes in biotechnological processes.

The three remaining principal chapters deal with the sources of seaweed in Europe. There is a very useful review of the current harvesting of a surprisingly wide range of species. Harvesting methods and the require- ments and approaches to resource management of harvested stocks are described. It is concluded that better resource management is required and that a more consistent quality of seaweed would perhaps be obtained by cultivation. Cultivation is considered separately for attached and unattached seaweeds. The chapter on attached seaweeds necessarily relies on the much greater experience of cultivation in the far east and gives the proper phycological and ecological background to cultivation as well as the techniques. Species choice for Europe and the legal aspects in various European countries are considered. While the invasive plant Sargassum muticum is seen as a scientifically good candidate for cultivation in Europe, it is nevertheless rejected because it is not indigenous. There is a particu- larly extensive literature list on attached seaweed culture. An interesting chapter reviews the possibility of unatta- ched culture of the weeds including species which might normally be attached in their usual habitat.

The final overview chapter recognizes the importance of the phycocolloid industry but initially seems to find little optimism at the present time in the other uses in Europe when considering the values of the products against the cost of obtaining them. However, looking to the future it is more hopeful, seeing possible expansion of the European seaweed industry, to some extent based on greater use of cultivation techniques.

This book is very interesting from two aspects; it is not only a good up-to-date set of reviews of a wide range of seaweed applications, but also it manages to put a European focus on what is often thought of as being mdre important in other continents. However, consideration of conservation is not particularly evident in this book. Admittedly resource management of seaweed stocks is considered but this is more from the point of view of

210 BOOK REVIEWS

preserving the commercial resource than of ecologically sympathetic harvesting. It is a gooi‘ hook about the industrial uses of seaweeds but perhaps just a little more mention of the environmental implications of the expansion of the seaweed industry, that it advocates, would have been desirable. Nonetheless this is an excel-

RIVER CONSERVATION AND MANAGEMENT, edited by P. J. Boon, P. Calow and G. E. Petts. John Wiley & Sons Ltd., Chichester, 1992, xiv+47Opp. Price: E65.00. ISBN 0 471 92946 8.

This book is derived from a series of papers presented at an international conference on the conservation and management of rivers, sponsored by the former Nature Conservancy Council of Great Britain and held at the University of York, England, in September 1990. The book is ‘intended for all those with an interest in achieving greater integration of conservation in the management of river systems’. Sixty three authors con- tributed to 29 chapters, making this an extensive and up- to-date account of this important, but often neglected topic.

The book is conveniently organized into four major sections but provides a welcome unified approach to the subject. In part this is due to the way the meeting was organized - a committee (which included the three editors) selected appropriate papers from a large number of abstracts which were offered by potential participants. Thus, unlike several other recent publications which have proved to be just a series of individual papers presented at a meeting and gathered together later under an all- embracing title, this volume really does live up to the reader’s expectations. In addition to a comprehensive content, it has been well structured and edited throughout.

In Section I, ‘The case for conservation’, the essential elements in the case for conservation are reviewed and four case histories of rivers in Poland, Israel, Australia and Trinidad are presented. In Section 11, ‘River classification and the assessment of conservation

lent book which should be bought for all libraries concerned with algae or with marine resources.

MARTIN WILKINSON Heriot-Watt University,

Edinburgh, UK

potential’, the general principles of classification and assessment of conservation potential are outlined and seven chapters deal with this topic in relation to rivers in several continents. In Section 111, ‘Recovery and rehabili- tation’, a series of nine chapters covers a wide variety of case histories of river recovery in quite diverse systems ~-

again covering many different countries. In Section IV, ‘Protecting rivers - legislation and public participation’, much of the material in the five chapters points to the enormous importance of catchment planning and man- agement. It is gratifying to see that a t last this important concept is receiving major recognition from scientists, and even some planners, throughout the world.

The introductory chapter concludes on a practical note: ‘We need politicians who dare, bureaucrats who want, and scientists/ engineers who can’. The concluding chapter ends more philosophically: ‘for effective conser- vation policies to be pursued it would appear inevitable for there to be a certain reversion to the limited resources view of the world and the associated and moral codes that accompany it’. Both attitudes are surely necessary if river conservation is to be a success story internationally.

Production of the book is of extremely high quality with clear text, excellent tables and figures throughout and several useful colour plates. There is a valuable index. The volume is highly recommended to all those with an interest in, or responsibility for, the conservation of river systems throughout the world, and all those concerned with its production are to be congratulated.

PETER s. MAITLAND Fish Conservat ion Centre,

Stirling, Scot land UK